visualchemist

Along with mixing custom colors, last night, I also printed up some new blind letterpress cards for Etsy. The message is quiet and simply stated. I didn’t really want to add color, leaving this card open to alternate envelope colors.

Last night, I mixed up three custom PMS colors for an upcoming job I will be printing within the next two weeks. I’ll probably add just a touch more black to the orange to really hit the burnt orange PMS color my client is looking for.

The other day, I made my first sale on Etsy. Woohoo! So, last night I was inspired to print up a few more letterpress greeting cards to add to my tiny, but growing, collection. I wanted to test some of the vintage blocks I had laying around. Some worked and some didn’t. The teddy bear I had hoped to print needed a little shaving on the edges. The turntables I printed up were just eh. I managed to put this little (big) piggy and an old moving truck to good use. I also printed up some vintage type blinds on the cool tags I bought weeks ago. I’ll be posting these items for sale on my Etsy shop (visualchemist.etsy.com) real soon. By the way, I finally fixed the header links up above. Now if only I can finish up my sites.

This vintage blue pig is actually part of a larger collection. Eventually, I hope to design twelve cards representing the entire Chinese zodiac lineup.

This card was inspired by good times and great friends. I have yet to verify this typeface and measure the height of this larger font.

Simple and sophisticated. No ink. Oooohh aaaahhhh, my favorite so far. This type was set using 36pt Stymie Light.

I bought this block because moving may be in our future. Someday.

I’ll be adding plenty more cards to my collection in the near future. Thanks for stopping by!

I’ve had several requests to print metallic silver ink on black. This was a quick test I did this morning to see how well the ink coverage performed on two sample dark substrates. Small Type INVISIBLE was set in 18pt. lead type and it printed quite crisp with even coverage, as did the huge WORD.

Word.

I finally took some time out to print my first project. In searching for my letterpress, I knew I eventually wanted to give thanks to those who have helped me along the way, so this first card is dedicated to a certain handful of individuals. Though there are still a few supplies I would like to acquire, I committed myself to printing a thank you card using the moveable type I received from Tooknap Press and a little vintage army tank dingbat I scored on eBay.

Even though this was my first print job, and I had not yet attempted a 2-color piece, I was up for the challenge. I knew ahead of time that I wanted the colors on this card to consist of army green and olive drab. I started the process by mixing my inks following the Pantone formula breakdown. A little ink goes a long way with letterpress, so as a test, I kept my color portions small.

I had originally locked up my type, tank and stars together, before realizing the need to be adventurous and attempt a 2-color job. I knew registering the artwork without proper gauge pins was going to be a challenge, but I was up for it. I was forced to improvise. I disassembled the chase as you see it here, and broke it down into two separate passes. I printed the bold type first, then the army tank together with the stars.

Through trial and error, here is the final result. Some of the challenges I faced were figuring out how to properly pack my press, mixing and laying the proper amount of ink on the ink disc, and registering multi-colored elements. I also realized that I wasn’t thrilled with the quoins and key I currently have, and could use a second chase to have ready to go.

I’ve been pretty bad with sending out thank you cards in the past, and now, I have no excuse.

My search is finally over, he’s out of my car, and I just couldn’t wait to sift through all the extras that he came with. Here he is, Mr. Price, sitting stoutly in his temporary new home in our garage. I still need to dust him off and gather an inventory of my newly acquired letterpress supplies. More importantly, I need to carve him out a new home up in our studio office, but even before doing that, I need to figure out what table we can use that is strong enough to carry the load of 200+ pounds.
I was given several large fonts and I could not wait to test one of them out. Through a series of specific visual questions on identifont.com, I was able to confirm that this font is Kabel by Rudolf Koch. Nice, clean, simple, modern, and also the favorite font of its previous owner at Tooknap Press.

At this point, I have all I need to start printing except for brand new sexy letterpress grade paper and some clean-up supplies. Here’s a shot of my first test, a blind pull on a piece of Fox River Starwhite paper.

Exciting times ahead.

This morning, I finally got to see the tasty photos of the wedding invitations I had designed for Danielle and Brian McAllister’s Cape May spring wedding. The wedding took place at Congress Hall in the little victorian town of Cape May, on the South Jersey Shore. The bride, who was also a good friend from back in the ROXY days, requested a “vintage classic design with a modern twist.” It was sort of a Great Gatsby affair. The hand picked wedding invitation colors were shades of bright yellow, tiffany blue, kelly green and bright red. The overall design complimented the Grand Ballroom’s 1920’s theme, black and white checkerboard floors and Tiffany blue walls. Every single detail was considered from the venue’s bright yellow exterior, to the black chandeliers hanging inside the Grand Ballroom. Even the subtle details from the tiny polka dots on the bride’s dress to the yellow and white stripes found outside on the beachfront cabanas found their way onto the invitation package. The bride is from the Jersey shore and the groom is from the California coast, so rather than using simple table numbers, it made sense to use the names of the beach towns from both coasts. With the venue on the opposite coast from where I live, it became a team effort to get these invitations just right. The bride made several trips to the venue and had taken photos for inspiration and detail. More invitation details can be found on my website. Photos: Tom Gooch.

Rather than continuing to spend money on workshops with very limited press time, I decided that I would put my hard earned money to good use by buying my own press. It took me a week of searching to realize that finding my perfect press (a Chandler & Price Pilot) was going to be a difficult task, as anyone that has one isn’t exactly willing to give it up, or anyone looking to get rid of theirs is looking to make a small fortune.

In my search, I found out how amazingly helpful and tight the letterpress community actually is. I’ve made contact with a lot of the Who’s Who’s in the business and they were all extremely helpful in turning me to someone they thought could better answer my questions. (Special thanks to Dave Churchman!)

I’m a believer in fate and destiny and I believed all along that the press that was meant for me would eventually find me… WE would eventually find each other, and I was willing to wait until that day came.

Two weeks passed and after countless emails, eBay/Craiglist searches, and antique store hopping, I decided to try my luck at the International Printing Museum to see if they had any presses they could part with. It turns out that they had several, although they each were in need of some sort of TLC/repair. I managed to have a press reserved for me, but after a month of patiently waiting, I decided to take a quick look to see what was up for grabs on Craigslist.

Suddenly, the sea parted and the stars aligned, angels sang and the sun peeked from the clouds. A local Pilot had been listed just the night before! I emailed the seller and sure enough, it was still available.

Woohoo!

We made arrangements to meet and four days later, I was finally the proud owner of a new (old) Chandler & Price Pilot Letterpress.

I brought my family along and made the quick drive up to Hollywood where we picked up all 200 lbs of solid cast iron, and a bunch of great letterpress extras. Inks, furniture, lead type, tympan paper, a Boxcar base — just to name a few. Christine of Tooknap Press was way more than generous in handing over the miscellaneous doo dads that would have taken me forever to acquire. I left feeling like I had won some geeky letterpress lottery or something. In a way, I think I did.

We finally took the press out of my car earlier tonight and I can’t wait to play with all my new toys! I’ll share photos once I can get into the boxes and sort through my new (old) treasure.

The other day, I purchased a vintage print block with a really awesome deer graphic. I couldn’t wait to see how it printed. Though it looked worn down in the photos, I thought I’d try it out and see what happens. It really did look like it had been around for quite a while, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me. You just never know with these things. Maybe it’s got a little more mileage left in it, maybe not. I took the chance, not wanting to pass up a really great piece, and besides, I thought it would go perfect with some thank you cards I had in mind.

Puns are silly fun, and some can even be quite clever. I enjoy them, or anything that has to do with a play on words. When I saw this deer, I immediately knew I wanted to create a “Thank You, Deer” card. For my type, I used Century Gothic for its clean and modern characteristics. Setting this short sentence in my composing stick took less than 5 minutes. It was playing around with the tracking and kerning that took forever.

Here he is, all inked up and ready to be cleaned. As you can see, I didn’t really set up my composing stick properly. To correctly center my type, I should have put equal amounts of spacing on both ends of the line. To correct this, when locking up my deer, the reglets needed to be adjusted to place him centered just above my uncentered type. So really, this is a lesson on what NOT to do. What I should have done was take that extra minute to set my type up properly.

Here is the final product. I’m not thrilled with how it came out, but for a second project, again, it’s not terrible. I’ll have to do another run of these cards when I have the time.

For my first “official” post, I decided to share my experience in letterpress printing. Anyone that really knows me, knows of my love for typography and attention to detail. Thanks to my friends at Permanent Ink, Lee Jay and Lilibeth, I enrolled in a letterpress workshop where I got my hands dirty in the oldest and slowest method of printing.

I truly appreciate the history and nostalgia of letterpress, a process rich in history and tradition. As a designer, I was excited to learn the craft. I love the tactile quality of letterpress and am inspired by movable type. Entering the workshop for the first time made me feel like a kid in a candy store, all wide-eyed and goofy.

As I picked through the workshop cases (or type drawers), I was transported back to Susan Merritt’s Beginning Graphic Design class, eons ago. I remember learning how to count characters in a paragraph using nothing but a pica ruler and learning terminology that was used back when the “Oregon Trail” was a way of life. All of it now so relevant. It made me appreciate learning the fundamentals of typography so much more. Back then, Adobe Photoshop 3.0 and Illustrator 5.5 were the latest in graphic software. FreeHand was alive and kicking and was still owned by Aldus, and InDesign was still to be invented.

Here I was, faced with my first real letterpress project. I found a case of 24pt “Cowboy” type and knew this was the one I wanted to use. On my instructors suggestion, I paired it with 18pt Bulmer.
I decided to print “We’re Moooooooving” cards, complete with a cute little cow dingbat.

I found type setting to be quite therapeutic. Seeing how fast and effortless it was to compose the larger fonts, I decided to take on the more ambitious task of setting a line of 6pt dingbat stars. I quickly learned the difficulty in setting small type, which made me appreciate this stuff even more. Once my type was composed, it was time to surround my type block with furniture and lock it up in the chase. I didn’t realize how heavy the whole set up was going to be until I lifted the chase and walked it over to the 8×12 Chandler & Price press for the first time.

Feeding paper into the press was a little intimidating at first. Your hands will get smashed if you aren’t careful or if you are prone to daydreaming, as I can be. Once things got going, the repetitive motion and sound of the press actually put me in a zone. I lost a few sheets in mid-panic of losing my finger tips, but that’s all part of the learning process. Here is my inked chase, ready to be cleaned up and disassembled.

I was a little disappointed to find that one of my 6pt stars had been worn down by time and another had fallen out completely. It was too late to make adjustments on press so I had to run this set. Lesson learned: irregularities in lead type may not be obvious until you pull your first proof. However, all is not lost. Though it did not come out absolutely perfect, I don’t think it came out too bad for my first piece. I could always go in and redraw the missing star if I really wanted to. One of these days, we actually will kick up our heels and move and I’ll be able to dust these cards off and drop them in the mail. If one of these cards happens to land in your mailbox, consider it a limited edition collectors piece. =)